Review: Big Daddy Double from Checkers

Posted May 25th, 2013 | 11:05am by Ryan

I’m sometimes guilty of gravitating towards fast food just because of the name of the product. Yeah I’m a rube with my drive-thru tendencies and here’s some evidence for you. This burger is called the Big Daddy Double and I couldn’t care less what was in it when I placed my order, I just liked the name. Checkers usually fails to disappoint me with their burgers too so I guess I’ll say this lunch choice wasn’t the most difficult decision for me.I’m assuming that Checkers locations in Maryland are a test market of sorts because I normally see grub that isn’t advertised on the Checkers website. The Big Daddy Double is a burger that I haven’t been able to dig up any details for online, so I don’t have all the specifics on the exact ingredients. From what I could tell, the Big Daddy Double consisted of two seasoned burger patties with a mix of crispy onion tanglers, grilled onions, pickles, American cheese and a Thousand Island style sauce on toasted sourdough. I’m pretty certain on all the ingredients except for the sauce, but Russian dressing/Thousand Island/Mac Sauce/Fry Sauce… whatever you want to call it, it’s some sort of ketchupy mayo based sauce. Priced at $2.99, the Big Daddy Double is a really solid value. Combine that with the fact that there was a 2 for $5 promo going on, this burger is a borderline great value. Those two hearty seasoned beef patties sandwiching that slice of cheese did everything to remind me how of much I appreciate Checkers staying true to what good fast food stands for. The core ingredients of the Big Daddy Double are that salty mix of beef and cheese which just scream guilty pleasure. When it comes to the rest of the burger, I don’t think that all of the ingredients worked particularly well together and my bread wasn’t completely toasted, but it wasn’t enough to detract from enjoying the burger overall. Come to think of it, the half-toasted sourdough looks a lot worse than it really was. With burgers, I like the “less is more” approach and feel sometimes places try too hard to fit in more unnecessary ingredients. This could’ve been a masterpiece without the distraction of pickles. Continuing the discussion of distracting ingredients, I don’t understand the point of the including both crispy fried onions and grilled onions. I’m partial to crispy, but either or would’ve worked just fine here. Surprisingly, there wasn’t an overwhelming onion taste to the Big Daddy Double by having the mix of crispy and grilled. The extra onions provided more heft to the sandwich and a little bit of a disconcerting feeling of not digging the soft and crunchy textures. I’d rather have a lot of crunch if you’re including crispy onion tanglers and adding in the grilled onions cut down on that. Rounding out the ingredients, the dressing was tangy familiarity. A Russian dressing style sauce is usually an easy way to bring a burger together.It’s hard to not appreciate a filling fast food burger at the three dollar mark. A big reason why Checkers stays true to great fast food is its understanding that $3 and under is where it belongs. The Big Daddy Double doesn’t reach the high praise I’ve given previous Checkers creations, but it’s by no means a bad burger. This sandwich is just stuck somewhere in between average and pretty good.

I’d say give it another shot sometime, because when it’s done right I feel that the Roadhouse Burger (with or without bacon) is the best burger Checker’s has to offer…it’s a 2 for $5 burger most of the time, too. I agree wholeheartedly with the review tho, Checker’s does it right and sells some fairly premium sandwiches at an incredibly cheap price point. And they have a lot of variety whereas some of the bigger chains have started pairing down their menu and, imo, have suffered for it.

I LOVE that they half-toasted it, because this proves that they CAN toast the bread. My local, awful Rally’s (sup, Hammond, Indiana) has never toasted any of their sourdough. So when these new burgers come out I think “Well, maybe they’ll actually toast it this time.” But nope. Soggy bread straight out of the drive thru window. I’ve been fooled, like, five times in as many years, so whatever. I’m sticking with the cheap as hell Rallyburger since it’s still my fave.

BTW – Rally’s actually does a BLT. It’s super ghetto – burger bun, bacon, lettuce, tomato + mayo, but at $1.49 it’s one of my favorite things on the menu. There’s usually at least 6 pieces of bacon on there too. Delicious.

I have been watching the Checkers commercials for days about the Big Daddy double burgers or chicken sandwich . They look wonderful on the commercial with in addition to the chicken or burgers, there is Swiss cheese, grilled onion, onion tangles, pickle and thousand island dressing. I stopped today and ordered one to go. I could hardly wait to press my teeth into it. Well, there was no Swiss cheese, grilled onion, onion tangles, pickle or thousand island dressing. What I received was a bun, piece of pressed chicken, a little chopped lettuce and a blob of mayonnaise. Yes I order the Big Daddy chicken sandwich as is advertised on TV. Total false advertising. The ninety nine cent chicken at McDonallds is better!

Wow, that’s insane. Sounds like you got the big chicken or spicy chicken instead of the Big Daddy. But, please, if you trust your local Checker’s enough to get it right the second time, go back and try it again, well worth it.